


Next Year's Harvest

by DratTheRat



Category: Dark Tower - Stephen King
Genre: Dark, Drug Use, Dubious Consent, F/M, Gangbang, Gen, Hallucinations, Horror, POV Cuthbert, Possibly Pre-Slash, Ritual Public Sex, Rituals, Short, Trippy, Underage - 16?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-09
Updated: 2019-04-09
Packaged: 2020-01-07 10:44:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 765
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18409028
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DratTheRat/pseuds/DratTheRat
Summary: Reap Night rituals in wartime are extreme, and Cuthbert is out of his mind.





	Next Year's Harvest

Cuthbert did not enjoy hallucinogens. He had no natural touch for the drugs to enhance, so everything he saw on them was nonsense twisted out of his imagination. Furthermore, they made him itch.

Right now, he itched in every way. His skin crawled, and he was antsy for his turn to fuck. It was that kind of ritual. He shivered and edged closer to the fire.

In Cuthbert’s imagination, Roland’s lover, Susan stared out of the flames. She was not burning; she was fire. 

“You are lovely, Cuthbert,” the crackles of her embers whispered. “You are out of your mind.”

On the other side of the bonfire, Roland, his skin stained orange with firelight, was taking his turn on top of the Harvest Girl. The elder gunslingers had already gone, and Cuthbert would be next. The girl was drugged up, too. 

“Are you jealous?” Cuthbert asked Susan in the fire. 

“Are you?” the fire answered back.

Roland finished, and Cuthbert took a step forward to take his place. Hands settled on his shoulder and bare back and guided him around the bonfire instead of into it.

“You are out of your mind,” Alain hissed in his ear.

“What do you see?” Cuthbert whispered back.

“Nothing but fire. Go on.”

Cuthbert stumbled over to the girl and crawled on top of her. Last year and every year before, he had observed the ritual from afar and felt his mother’s grip tighten on his shoulder as she watched his father take his turn. Cuthbert was less than glad to join him, but he was glad he had no sweetheart to make jealous.

“I am out of my mind,” he whispered to the Harvest Girl. “I’m sorry.” He did not think he knew her, but her face swam in the firelight. By tradition, she would be about his own age. 

“You are lovely,” said the Harvest Girl. She stroked his hair off of his sweaty forehead.

He smiled. “The fire told me that. Help me? I have only a few times. The drugs make my brain itch.”

“This is my sixth time in a row,” she said. 

She grabbed his cock, canted her hips, and helped him find his way inside her. In spite of his itch, he did his best to make it last a while, not for the girl, who surely must be ready for the night to end, but for his audience. 

“What do you really look like?” he asked as he got up.

“You are out of your mind,” she sighed. It was a tired sigh. “Am I done yet?”

“One more.”

This time, it was Roland who took hold of Cuthbert’s shoulders and steered him away from the girl. In the firelight, Alain’s pale, naked flesh glowed like the embers themselves. His muscles rippled like flames as he thrust.

“I want that,” Cuthbert said to the fire.

“What? What do you want?” Roland’s voice was in his ear.

Cuthbert leaned back against him. Roland’s flesh was sticky hot and so was his, but only Alain could be fire. 

“Do you remember Susan?”

Cuthbert felt his body slump before his mind gave out. Cut loose, his helpless consciousness floated behind his open eyes. He was smoke. Propped upright in Roland’s strong arms, he flew. On the other side of the fire, down below the platform, his mother was ash and darkness. 

Alain was standing now. He looked at Cuthbert through the fire. His yellow hair burned like a golden sun. 

“I hate this,” Alain muttered in his ear. In an instant, without taking a step, he stood in front of him.

Cuthbert thought he felt his body gasp.

Far away, the wind was growling, “Get him out of here on his own feet!”

“I’m sorry,” Alain said. “I’ll give you strength to walk, but you’ll get something else from me as well. I lied before. You were the one who saw nothing but fire.”

His hand on Cuthbert’s face burned and then slid away, slime slick. Roland pried him off his sticky chest, and Cuthbert stood. Half of his mind was lying down. As soon as they were out of sight, the rest of it would fall down, too, and his body would vomit, but, for now, the other half was tied to Alain’s consciousness. Carefully, they walked off the platform in tandem, like children in a three legged race. The fire was gone, and autumn wind snaked icily across their skin, wet but no longer with sweat. The fire had left holes in everything, and, perforated, both of them were drenched in blood.


End file.
